Anybody out there re-cantilever their cartridge with a Soundsmith Contact Line diamond ?

Maybe it’s time to try something different? Or you are so in love with DV-20x2 ?

upstateaudio, - irish_tim, - johnsonwu, - and - tooblue, for sharing your personal dealings in having your cartridge work done by Soundsmith. Actually having the work done, and in the case of "tooblue" multiple cartridges, has provide my search question with empirical experience.

Anyone out there had a Soundsmith modification done to their cartridge, if so which option had you had done, and what’s been your experience?

As for "chakster", although your contributions maybe well intended, they do not address the question, you do not  appear to have any personal experiences in dealing with Soundsmith’s work, therefore your input adds up to nothing but conjecture and a waste of everyone’s time including your own. Perhaps in the future you’ll consider directing your energies in less vacuous pursuits.

 for your contributions. And @chakster, very good of you to take the time to draft such a comprehensive post. Seems like you have a good heart.

@tooblue ; your sense of humour appears to contain elements of provocation. Our jibs have a similar cut.

Guys for me, my listening room is 13x14x8, with a 7ft wide archway which leads into another 13x14x8 room. The room is treated with conventional materials, front wall has a heavy blind, crown-mouldings, corner book cases, rug, and picture frames. Had I an 18-20x28-35 room with 12ft ceilings, I might consider changing my preamp for one that could boost a LOMC 0.03-0.25. But sonically/financially I can't justify shelling out that kind of money to jump on the Law of Diminishing Returns game. Further more I am not interested in adding another phono preamp either. I like my preamp.

I run an Oracle Delphi II table, with a modified Rega RB300 tonearm. The arm is rewired and has the elliptical Kerry Titanium counterweight.

Cartridges are the Grado Sonata I, and the Dynavector 20x2.

My Pre-Amp is a two box AUDION Premier 2.0 Line Preamplifier / MM, with four Siemens E88CC 6922 tubes.

Tuner: Philips AH673

Amp is a Classe' Audio DR9

Speakers are 946 Focal Electra's, and I keep a pair of Meadowlark Heron Hot Rods laying around.

Cables are XLO UltraPlus and I use Kimber speaker wire.

It's not a bad system. Would I like to move up to a Class A amp and run a pair of Martin Logan Summits - - perhaps. But in my room I don't think they'd work.

So as you can see Gentlemen I'm limited to either a HOMC cartridge or a MM. Getting back to @chakster, I'm not sure where you've found a Dynavector 20x2 for $800 dollars? The Needle Doctors wants $1,150.00 US, plus being Canadian the exchange tacks on another 36 cents/dollar.

Hello

chakster

- Thx for your suggestions, I will take them under consideration.

As for your suggestion (Skip the Dyna 20XHO2 refurbishing, & go SS MI). Don’t think didn’t think about it.

My previous set-up was Grado Sonata 1, a MI cart, right? And it hummed. Checked the grounds - OK.

One reason for picking the Dyna 20X2 (with-in my budget) was to check if the hum was coming from the MI cart. As it turns out the HOMC doesn’t hum. But the re-tipping thing goes a bit deeper in my case. I never got use the Dyna 20X2 when I bought it, the cantilever was bent by the installer. I didn’t want to throw in the towel. So if you are going to fix something why not use superior parts?

Look at it this way, the designer has to engineer a product, with cost restraints. It sells for a price, the materials used have to fit with-in those restraints in-order to turn a profit. If they could use better materials in a product with a $1000 dollar price point, why wouldn’t they? So it only stands to reason if one is going to repair something why not take a said song & make it better? - - - Will it sound identical .... perhaps not, but at least the hum is gone.

Anyway chakster the set-up sounds pretty damn good. As for your Audio-Technica AT-ML150 suggestion, I had a Grace F9 MM and loved it. If the Audio-Technica is as sweet I’ll thank you latter.

As for moving up to a LOMC, my preamp is designed for MM cartridges an (Audion Premier 2box) which I love, so I’m not going to go on another audio quest to accommodate a MC set-up. Besides, with the limitations of my listening room, I couldn’t justify the expense of a ZYX cartridge with the sonic gains it would render. In an acoustically ideal room .... yes.